There are times when it's obvious that some news was for the night before, but that's when I scroll down. I think that was the whole point of way back when that Blue started including the previous days news on the front page, and making the archives two days each.

I don't know of anyone that works harder than Blue. In fact the evidence that his posting dates are later than many others just indicates that he worked harder on them.

But, of course we all know he was probably just playing some new game that was recently released and can't get out of his mind. Then when he sleeps probably jerks awake and swears he heard a squad approaching.

Good to hear the story ended happily...hopefully ever after. I suggest some chicken wire buried a good 2 feet under the fence. It does seem to keep the skunks out, but perhaps a dog will keep digging until it can get under the fence, or to China, whichever comes first. But, at least you will notice the bigger hole before it's large enough for Hudson to fit through and patch it up.

I recommend waiting until it cools down...around midnight, get out there with a flashlight and a chainsaw...oh...wait...that's what I suggest for the Delta Labs test subjects in Doom3.

Uh, just curious, but maybe Hudson can hear Doom3 and believes it to be real. I mean, what's there to prevent animals from thinking a computer is just another window? Maybe Hudson was just looking for the exit...anywhere except where that growling is coming from.

What's next? A Sigourney Weaver trick and all the weapons can be tapped together? It would mean not having to reload the one you got, or waiting until the first weapon is stowed and the next is deployed.

I'm playing Doom3 as idsoftware intended it. I'm equiped far better than good enough to make it through on hard...I'm frequently leaving behind ammo and armor (though I'm consuming plenty of health...something about bleeding all the way through the levels to draw the demons or something maybe). I consider anyone looking for a way to artificially improve their gear by hacking to be whoosies.

After doing some timedemos and playing the game some, I realized that it takes a short while for all the maps to be snugged up into a video card. I enabled showFPS and in the first couple of minutes of loading a new level my system shows around 15FPS max, but then after playing for about 5 minutes it levels out to around 30FPS. Also, after reloading a level I start out at around 30FPS.

Just an FYI for those tweaking their systems. As I mentioned in another post I have a 1.4Ghz P4 with 384MB of RAM and a AGP 4X slot with a 128MB FX 5200 video card. I'm able to run High quality if I drop my resolution down to 640x480, but after looking at 800x600 I don't see as big of a difference in images between resolutions as I do between medium (default for 128MB cards) and high quality. And, 30FPS is excellent, I don't see any choppiness or hesitation after I get the level all loaded up. In fact, I reload just as soon as I get to a level and voila, instant 30FPS...sweeet!

It looks like blue has gotten to that part too...you know the part. The sinister laughter...the phantoms...I'm glad it's not real!

I've made it past the first Boss taking the EFS (EPF?) route...I will have to play it again to check the other route as well. The first boss is really cool...she dances well, and dies well too...I wonder how many Bosses there will be?

Has anyone else noticed the Gremlins from Quake mission pack 1? I have not given them a chance to steal any weapons, but I don't think these Gremlins have that ability...just the slashing/jabbing arms...they also don't chatter much. In fact, I don't find the monsters making that much vocal noise at all...it's mostly just sound effects. Or, maybe they are, but I'm just not giving them a chance to say anything.

I dred the daylight...and hope night comes soon...along with demons, hellspawn, and possessed humans whose eyes glow in the dark.

It's not over Equinoux. Now that you have completed the game on one of the other difficulty levels (you played it on easy didn't you) the game makes nightmare level available....muhahaha. Get back in there marine, or are you a chicken...is that your game in the mess hall?

Since I have a 1.4Ghz P4 I was worried that the installation/detection routine might pop up with a dialog box that says, "Sorry a 1.5Ghz or faster processor is required for Doom3" and clicking on OK just exits from the install, or it will install but not run, etc...real evil nightmares for the last few weeks.

The other problem I was having was with my graphics card. I bought Thief3 at the same time that I bought my Doom3 pre-release. It wouldn't install...said I needed a card that supported something called a Pixel Shader 1.0! I thought WTF, a pixel can only have a 24bit color descriptor, how can it be shaded? So, I ripped out my 64MB GeForce 2 Ultra and went looking for a graphics card. I didn't have much money after buying both games and all the new stuff was way over $300, and even last years cards FX 59x0 et la were over $200. Then I spied a 64MB FX 5600 for $79 which claimed to have Pixel Shader 2.0 so I picked up the box. But, then another box caught my eye which had a tag indicating that it was on sale for $69...a 128MB FX 5200. I figured hey, an extra 64MB and $10 cheaper! Thank God I bought it...even though the 5600 GPU runs at 325Mhz compared to the 250Mhz of the 5200 I decided that the extra 64MB of RAM was needed since the Thief3 specs indicated that 128MB was required for high quality textures.

Final result: I am able to select High Quality then cycle through the resolutions until I set it at 640x480. My average fps is 16.4 compared to the 19.0 on medium quality but those images are crystal clear. One place I noticed a real difference was in the floor of the kitchen/break area. The medium quality textures had missing corners...it looked like the corners had some kind of design like many linoleum floors do. But, the high quality texures showed that the floors are actually perfectly square tiles with sharp corners. I don't have a any other cards to test, but I figure that anyone with a 128MB video card could select High quality and drop down to 640x480 resolution. The only slowness I see in gameplay is at the very beginning for around 10 seconds until the textures are all situated in the graphics card and then perhaps once or twice just before entering a new area...I can live with that.

So, being able to play at High quality with a system that is slower than the required on a graphics card that is the bottom of the line is just blastin!

I ran some timedemos for my system which I believe was state of the art in 2001...P4 1.4Ghz 400Mhz FSB with 384MB of 400Mhz RAMBUS memory. I upgraded to a 128MB FX 5200 so I can take advantage of the DirectX 9.x features.

Doom3 auto detected my hardware and configured settings for medium quality at 640x480 resolution which timedemoed 19.0 average fps which is about the best fps for my hardware (low quality at 640x480 timed in at 19.2). After looking at the quality of screenshots I determined that the High quality images were far superior to the medium quality even if medium quality was jacked up to 800x600 resolution. The final result was selecting High quality images, then dropping resolution down to 640 x 480 which gives me all of the awesome effects and everything close up is in complete detail so the only time I see a degredation in image quality is when objects are far away. The time demo for High quality @ 640 x 480 was 16.4fps. The only time I notice any problems in gameplay is when a level first loads...it takes several seconds to get all the textures loaded and running smooth, then a jerk or two as I move into the level. But, after taking a few peaks around the first couple of corners the gameplay is smooth.

I recommend setting High quality images and 640 x 480 resolution for anyone with a 128MB video card.

Time says it will take 30 hours to complete the game. It looks like the Doom movie has taken the next step. A producer and lead actor have stepped up to grab the glory.

Universal Pictures has a Doom movie set to film in Prague this winter, with producer John Wells — of such respectable fare as ER and The West Wing — attached. (The Rock reportedly has his sights set on the starring role.)

Sweet. I think the Rock would be perfect. But wtf is the filming being done in Prague? Oh well. I'm getting my copy of Doom3 in less than 12 hours, so I don't care what the world does as long as I still have electricity for the next week or so.

feel like playing a new game... I wonder if anything interesting is coming out soon?

Blue, I remember when Quake2 first came out. I think you actually missed a few days cause your head was stuck in the game and couldn't get it out long enough to follow through on your emails. Wasn't there something you did to keep yourself from spending too much time playing? I forget. Anyway, happy gibbing Blue. I'll have to wait another 24 hours before I'm in Hell. Hehe...going to hell is what I want to do...I wonder if it will be a vacation spot in the future when we break through to Hades? No rain except for the fireballs, can't see the clouds cause the smoke is coating the lower atmosphere...yeah, that's the place.

That's funny...idsoftware says it is. They said that Doom3 was developed as if Doom 1 & 2 never existed. Of course the levels will be new, and there are some new monsters and weapons, but other than that it's just a UAC marine stranded on mars and battling hellspawn through level after level of monsters, traps, and secrets...surely someone has found at least one secret! OK, don't tell me...I'll find out myself.

Perhaps this should be my last post, cause people are starting to talk about the game itself now. So, I'll check back in the forums in about a week to see where everyone is. Hopefully the trolls will be under the bridge where they belong and not on the bridge stopping the travelers from crossing.

Oh yeah! That's what I'm looking for! Just give me flashlight first, then a little bigger demon and then a little bigger gun and then a little bigger demon and a little bigger gun, etc. Heck, the corridors and levels can be all exactly the same, I don't care. The fun is dodging the attacks by the demons and taking them down like a cheer leader's skirts.

If you don't like that then this game is not for you. You should have played Doom 1 & 2 cause this is a remake of those FPSs. If you want story then get FF7 or an RPG. Doom3 is just like the other doom series...hell has opened up and the demons are invading, and you are the only one there to kick their sorry azzez back to hell.

I'm also hoping there is a nightmare skill level, which you apparently didn't find, that respawns new monsters every 5 seconds. So, you are just playing the initial game release. The mods are going to tear you a new orific to play with. And, the demo version will not run the mods. Eventually every serious gamer will have to purchase Doom3 or be left behind playing Quake2 and Quake3. Don't confuse what I'm saying, cause I'm not saying those games aren't good, since there's still plenty of people playing Quake DM, CTF, TF, etc. and I fire up the single player of Quake2 and Q2:MP2 at least every year. I just don't see an engine like FarCry or UnReal Tournament displacing the awesome power of the Doom3 engine.

[bTo put things in perspective, most production levels in DOOM 3 contain more media assets than all of Quake 3: Arena. When we started working on the memory foot print, our goal was a 256MB system. In most cases loading up an area of the game on a 256MB system works fine, the problems arise when you start to transition from one area to the next ( successive map loads ). Memory fragmentation starts to really work against us and it ultimately made it just not feasible for a reasonable play experience to support 256MB.

He further confirms that when they started seeing this for Ultra quality then they ignored their 256MB limit and let the grass grow so to speak until the video memory requirement reached 500MB for totally uncompressed video...and called it Ultra quality.

They also found that if they just compress the normal maps then they could easily fit everything into a 256MB card...and called it High quality.

They then found that if they also compressed the specular and diffuse maps then they can fit everything into a 128MB card...and called it medium quality.

They then did what has been done for decades and downsized the textures and specular maps so that they fit into 64MB cards...and called it low quality.

Given your video card history then it's time to sell/trade that 128MB card in for a 256MB card or you won't get good gameplay from High quality, though medium quality will indeed be a nice experience...I think dropping $325 for a 128MB card when I dropped $70 for a 128MB card (FX 5200) which will also run medium quality though perhaps not as high a resolution as the 6800 is just a waste of money when you just needed to spend another $80 bucks to get High quality.

Ray, I never use V-Synch and never see tearing, and my eyes have exceptional retinas and my brain seems to be way faster than most people in my computer engineering class. It may be because I have an awesome monitor (22" iiyama) that can handle the faster refresh rates. I think you are exagerating to get your point across...which got lost somewhere in the shuffle...so, uh what was your point?

Pay attention grunts who didn't pay attention in class and all you FNGs. WebDemon did his homework. Didn't everyone wonder why all the performance charts had 30fps in the middle of the chart and 60fps as the max, and a smooth gameplay is defined as above 30fps while choppy play occurs when fps drop below 30?